TEN thousand NHS office jobs could be axed after three more top-ranking officials resigned today in Labour’s brutal health service reforms.
Back office staff numbers will be cut by half at NHS England and the Department of Health to funnel more cash to the frontline.
The two organisations have a headcount of almost 20,000 people, meaning 10,000 could go.
NHS England’s chief financial, operations and delivery officers all quit on Monday.
Julian Kelly, Emily Lawson and Steve Russell were paid a combined £545,000 last year.
Their resignations take the top brass exodus to five after the medical director and CEO also resigned in the past fortnight.
[quote credit=”Sir James Mackey” credit-meta=”Incoming transition CEO, NHS England”]We have significant challenges and changes ahead[/quote]NHS England will not be allowed to hire any more people and is being “radically reduced”.
A source said: “We are facing enormous challenges with our NHS.
“We need to take radical measures and stop people being held back by pointless paperwork and inefficiency.
“We’ve got to be more productive because it’s holding back both patient care and the economy.”
MPs last month accused health officials of being “complacent and out of ideas”.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting is now taking an axe to NHS leadership after last year’s review said over-management has become a burden on nurses and doctors.
A review by Lord Darzi found the number of pen-pushers at regulators and head offices had soared from 13,000 to 20,000 between 2014 and 2024.
Office staff only found out about mass job cuts today and said the “drastic” restructure is unfolding fast.
Streeting will share power between local health boards and civil servants in his department.
In an email to NHS staff, CEO Amanda Pritchard – who will step down at the end of March – said the moves will “eradicate duplication” and free up more than £175million.
She said: “I know this news will be very unsettling.
“It is not a reflection on the work of NHS England or any of you.”
Her replacement and incoming ‘transition CEO’, Sir James Mackey, is setting up a new transformation team to overhaul NHS England.
He said: “We have significant challenges and changes ahead.”
Matthew Taylor, chief of the NHS Confederation which represents health bosses, said: “These changes are the biggest reshaping of the NHS’s national architecture in more than a decade.”
Thea Stein, chief of the Nuffield Trust think-tank, said: “The Government should be careful that this doesn’t lead to even more top-down micro-management from Whitehall, which has been the bane of the health service.”
Health Secretary Wes Streeting said: “We are entering a period of critical transformation for our NHS.
“With a stronger relationship between the Department for Health and Social Care, and NHS England, we will work together with the speed and urgency needed to meet the scale of the challenge.”